Edmonton's NDP candidates hope a surge of support builds into a new orange wave

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Federal party saw an average 11 percentage increase in vote share across city

Stephen David Cook · CBC News · Posted: Sep 27, 2021 

Edmonton Centre's NDP candidate Heather MacKenzie came in a close third in last week's federal election, seeing a boost in vote share common to orange campaigns across all Edmonton ridings. (Craig Ryan/CBC)

The results of Monday's federal election seemed to be a repeat of the last throughout the blue sea of Alberta — with few notable exceptions.

NDP candidate Blake Desjarlais hopes he is starting a new political future in Edmonton Griesbach, where his win flipped a riding that has been Conservative in one form or another for decades.

"I think that we stand a good shot the next election at not only retaining this seat but expanding across Alberta, particularly in Edmonton and Calgary," he said.

Desjarlais' win was part of an overall trend that saw a big bump in the NDP's share of votes compared to 2019 across all of Edmonton's 11 ridings. The rise was a stark contrast to the other two major parties: Conservatives on average saw a 13.8-point drop while Liberals stagnated at a loss of around 0.1 points.

Percentage point increases of vote share by the federal NDP in Edmonton ridings. (CBC News)

Liberal candidate Randy Boissonnault barely clinched the Edmonton Centre riding from incumbent Conservative James Cumming but hard on their heels was the NDP's Heather MacKenzie.

"The NDP in Edmonton Centre have never shown better," she said last week. "This is a historic campaign for us — we had a higher percentage of the vote than ever before."

MacKenzie's campaign finished about 4.9 per cent — around 2,000 ballots — behind the winner, and she predicts the next cycle will draw in more supporters and more resources, topping the approximately $50,000 she estimated was raised during her campaign.

"I think everybody knows we could take it in the next election," she said.

The impact of COVID-19

The province's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic likely played a part in pushing voters away from Erin O'Toole's Conservatives but the NDP, led by Jagmeet Singh, did not win all the gains, said political analyst John Brennan.

The People's Party of Canada (PPC) also saw a small bump.

But overall, Brennan believes that the federal NDP candidates were beneficiaries of the harsh criticism levelled at Alberta's UCP government by the province's NDP Opposition party.

"I really think it drove down support for the federal Conservatives in Edmonton," Brennan said.

Percentage point differences in vote share since 2019 in Edmonton ridings. (CBC News)

Brennan pointed out that the NDP is not a stranger to Edmonton's electorate — in the 2019 provincial election, 20 of 21 electoral districts in the city went to the party.

But it's too early to count on an orange wave next go-around, he said.

Right now, he said, the federal NDP has a safe seat in Strathcona and a fighting chance in Centre and Griesbach. "The rest of the ridings, we'll wait and see."

• 'Kenney effect' hurt federal Conservatives on Alberta election night, experts say

• Conservative support sags as Albertans add Liberal, NDP MPs

There's not even a guarantee that the NDP's gains from this election will carry over into the long term, he said.

"This particular election was a unique one," Brennan said.

PPC support grew across Edmonton as it did throughout much of Alberta. In Edmonton Griesbach, the NDP victory came by around 1,500 votes — less than the 2,600 garnered by the PPC.

Whenever the next election comes, Brennan says the pandemic could be a distant memory, along with the anti-restrictions campaigning that may have seen some conservative voters go from blue to purple.

"The national election will probably be fought on entirely different issues."

The NDP campaign in Edmonton Riverbend, led by candidate Shawn Gray, outperformed both its 2015 and 2019 results. (Submitted by Shawn Gray)

In Edmonton Riverbend, NDP candidate Shawn Gray is optimistic the results signal a shift in the electorate.

"People are starting to understand that the NDP is the progressive option when stacked against the Conservatives," he said.

In his riding, the party saw a vote share increase of around 10 percentage points over both the 2015 and 2019 elections. The Conservative campaign saw around a 12-point drop since 2019 but still won with 45 per cent of the total vote.

Gray ran a COVID-conscious campaign from home, estimating he had under $10,000 in expenditures. Outreach events were cancelled, including a planned "Drag Out the Vote" drag show featuring local performers.

He hopes to take another crack at running and — bolstered by this election's results — see even more support from the party.

"I would love for Jagmeet to come to a drag event next time."

Liberals were unprepared for volatile emotions on campaign trail, misread enthusiasm for an election

An August poll showed a five-point national lead on the Conservatives and 'behind the scenes most of us were pushing for an election,' a Liberal MP said

Author of the article: Ryan Tumilty, Christopher Nardi
Publishing date: Sep 27, 2021 • 

Protesters shout as Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau arrives to campaign in Nobleton, Ont., on August 27. PHOTO BY CARLOS OSORIO/REUTERS

OTTAWA – Liberal insiders and MPs believe outside events more than internal mistakes shaped the election campaign and that Justin Trudeau’s future as leader is entirely in his hands.

The Liberals have 159 seats in Parliament, up just two from where they were, and they are 11 seats shy of the majority government Trudeau hoped for when he went to Rideau Hall.

The decision to call an election in the fourth wave of a pandemic dogged Trudeau in the campaign, but insiders who spoke to the National Post on the condition of anonymity, said there was little dissent on the timing of the campaign.

One senior campaign official said the prime minister made the final call, but the spring sitting of the House of Commons had been a grind, with opposition parties filibustering legislation and voting against the government dozens of times and there was no desire for a similar fall sitting.

A Leger poll done the weekend the election was called, showed the party had a five-point national lead on the Conservatives and solid leads in most regions of the country.

One Liberal MP said with those numbers most people inside the party wanted to go as soon as possible.

“Behind the scenes most of us were pushing for an election.”

All of the sources who spoke with the National Post said after the election was called, it was clear they had misread the public’s enthusiasm for an election.

It was like nothing we've seen before, those angry people screaming at us

On the campaign trail, Trudeau said the decision to run was about giving Canadians a say on the major changes that the pandemic had brought and the path forward. They also felt there was a risk moving forward without a mandate.

“You could overplay your hand in the long run.”

They said the polls looked good, but they also fully expected a close race.

“We felt confident with our position, but by no means was it a slam dunk.”

The slam dunk definitely failed to materialize in the first two weeks of the campaign, as the crisis in Afghanistan dominated headlines and Trudeau continued to face questions about why the campaign was necessary.

Unlike opposition leaders, Trudeau wears two hats during a campaign; Liberal leader and prime minister. One source close to Trudeau said early on the public and media’s focus was strictly on Afghanistan, which made it difficult to talk about Liberal policy and promises.

One insider said the Liberals wanted this to be a campaign about who Canadians trusted to end the pandemic and manage the recovery, but instead it focused on what critics described as an “unnecessary election.”

“The ballot question could have been clearer,” a senior Liberal said with a sigh. “Emotions (were) much more volatile. So you had everything in the cards to have a very polarizing debate. And that’s something that we underestimated.”

Trudeau was also dogged by anti-vaccine protests, especially in the early weeks. He was forced to cancel one event and had gravel thrown at him at another.

Protestors wait for an election campaign visit by Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, which was cancelled citing security concerns, in Bolton, Ontario, August 27, 2021. 

PHOTO BY CARLOS OSORIO/REUTERS

Trudeau deals with protesters regularly, mostly on climate change and reconciliation, but one Liberal source said this was much different.

“It was like nothing we’ve seen before, those angry people screaming at us.”

Another campaign official said the protesters were mostly aligned with the People’s Party of Canada, but it enforced the Liberals pandemic message, because Canadians saw they were protesting Trudeau’s events and not the Conservatives.

Several Liberal campaign sources said the Conservative campaign was impressive, softening Erin O’Toole’s image and introducing him to the public. An event where O’Toole hung out with rescue dogs and promised tougher animal cruelty laws, was particularly well done, one Liberal said.

The first direct contest of the election was TVA’s French language debate. Trudeau went hard in the debate on O’Toole’s gun control stance hoping to create a wedge.

O’Toole raised eyebrows when he said he would not repeal a ban on assault weapons and Trudeau pounced, repeatedly citing the page of the Conservative platform that said the opposite.

“The PM opened a door for us on the gun issues and we drove a bus through it,” said one senior campaign advisor.

Public Safety Minister Bill Blair held five press conferences to highlight O’Toole’s inconsistencies on the gun file, but the campaign also wanted to highlight other areas where O’Toole seemed to have more than one opinion.

O’Toole ran on a platform promising to secure employee pensions in bankruptcy cases, but had previously spoken out against such a measure. The Liberals also pointed out O’Toole was saying he was pro-choice, but his caucus had voted in favour of a law that would prevent abortion for sex-selection purposes.

“We were trying to demonstrate to Canadians that Erin O’Toole would say anything,” said one source.

The Conservative momentum largely stalled under those attacks, working better than the Liberal imagined.

“We wanted to put the contrast there. We just didn’t think it would take six days for him to get to his position,” said one source

.

Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh, and Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole take part in the federal election English-language Leaders debate in Gatineau, Quebec, Sept. 9, 2021. 

PHOTO BY ADRIAN WYLD/POOL VIA REUTERS

The TVA debate helped the Liberals, but debates can both giveth and taketh away.

Up to that point in Quebec, the Liberals’ campaign was going swimmingly. By the beginning of week four, the Liberals were polling at 34 per cent in the province, a seven-point lead over the Bloc opponents.

“In Quebec, we made no mistakes. We had the best campaign in the country,” a senior Liberal said. “There were no errors. No ministers screwed up, even Infoman couldn’t find anything to run on our candidates,” they added, referring to a popular Quebec news and politics satire show.

But then came the final English debate and a controversial question from moderator Shachi Kurl.

Within the first minutes, she asked Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet to explain why he denied Quebec has a problem with racism in light of two pieces of provincial legislation she described as “discriminatory”.

At a debate viewing party in Montreal hosted by Liberal minister Steven Guilbeault, candidates, staffers and volunteers gasped when they heard the question. A single, f*** was heard around the room.

“Because of the English debate’s stupid question and Quebec bashing, we lost eight points during that (final) week,” one source said.

The following day, Trudeau (and all other major party leaders) came out against Kurl’s question, describing it as “offensive.”

But the damage was already done. The question gave life to the Bloc Québécois, who had thus far unsuccessfully tried to bring identity issues — which fuelled the party’s success in the 2019 election — back to the forefront.

Quebec Premier François Legault fuelled that fire, with regular outings to denounce the question and the moderator, keeping the issue alive for days, giving the Bloc a purpose and Quebeckers a reason to vote for them.

“Once the Bloc does well in Quebec it is hard for any government, Liberal or Conservative, to get a majority,” said one senior Liberal.

The Liberals’ Quebec campaign took another unexpected turn in the later weeks of the election when Legault invited Quebecers not to vote for the party (and the NDP and Greens) because he considered their “centralizing” platforms to be “dangerous.”

But one Quebec source says instead of hurting the party, that outing galvanized and motivated the Liberal base.

All sources agree that a “strong ground game” was an essential factor in ensuring they stay in government.

“A lot of ridings were won by one or two per cent because of the fact we had fantastic candidates that had very strong (campaign) machines. We were able to …do the right investments in these ridings based on the data that candidates were providing through their voter identification,” one senior Liberal source said.

They added that their efforts on the ground reaped “four more seats” in target ridings in British Columbia, something they said hadn’t happened in “a long, long time.”

In Quebec, sources say the Liberals’ organization allowed them to dream of winning “five to ten” more seats, and then to keep the same number of seats from falling to the Bloc during its late-election surge.

“We were able to stay in government because of these local machines,” one source said. Another pointed out the fact that the party won 20 of the 26 closest races in the country and said it’s all because of a well built and well maintained volunteer effort.

“The single most impactful day of the campaign is pretty much solely in the hands of local volunteers,” said one campaign official.

In the campaign’s final week, several Liberals said Alberta Premier Jason Kenney’s apology and reversal on COVID measures was another turning point, putting the Conservative campaign even more on the defensive.

“That helped us move the dial in B.C. in particular,” one senior source noted.

Many expressed surprise at how O’Toole handled the issue, doing few press conferences or events, effectively ceding the campaign’s final days to Trudeau who held multiple events across the country each day.

As they hit election day, most say they expected to have somewhere in the range of 140 to 150 seats, not the 159 they ultimately ended with. “We were pleasantly surprised,” said one campaign official.

Trudeau has now fought three consecutive elections for the party; no prime minister has ever won four consecutive campaigns. That includes Trudeau’s father who lost to Joe Clark in his fourth election, only to run again in 1980 and win in a fifth campaign

Liberals all say that this Trudeau is unlikely to face any internal pressure to leave, even after the election that failed to return a majority.

Most of Trudeau’s MPs were elected in 2015, when he brought the party from third place to a majority government. One senior campaign official said there is no chance he will be pushed out anytime soon.

“He has the confidence of the cabinet, the caucus and the party for sure.”

One MP said Trudeau’s ability to draw a crowd, to draw a few hundred supporters with little notice to hear him speak for less than 30 minutes, is an under appreciated skill, one that would be difficult to replace.

Despite everything that went wrong for the party in the election, they said a majority was fairly close at hand and it would be a different narrative.

“A couple more points across the country and he is a political genius.”

• Email: cnardi@postmedia.com | Twitter: ChrisGNardi

• Email: rtumilty@postmedia.com | Twitter: ryantumilty

Canadian Hurricane Centre Watching Possible Track of Hurricane Sam

Sep 27, 2021 | 7:12 AM

(Photo via Canadian Hurricane Centre Twitter.)

Newfoundland and Labrador could find itself in the crosshairs of yet another hurricane next week, but forecasters are warning that it is still far too early to make any determinations about the storm’s path.

With the damage caused by Hurricane Larry still fresh in mind, social media was abuzz over the weekend after the Canadian Hurricane Centre posted a graphic showing this province in the possible track for Hurricane Sam.

Sam is currently a category four storm in the southern part of the Atlantic Ocean.

Though Newfoundland is in the potential track, the Canadian Hurricane Centre notes that there is a “very broad range” in terms of possible tracks at this time, which show that the storm could hit the island or stay well out in the Atlantic.

Environment Canada meteorologist Mike Vandenberg says there’s still “significant uncertainty” in the hurricane’s guidance.

He says it’s not outside the realm of possibility for Sam to hit us, but it is still far too early to tell.

In the storm’s immediate future, Vandenberg says the storm will arc towards Bermuda as the week progresses.

Sam holds onto major hurricane status, eyeing potential Canadian impact

Monday, September 27th 2021, 9:28 am - The Canadian Hurricane Centre is monitoring Hurricane Sam for any potential impacts to Canada late this weekend and into early next week.

Hurricane Sam continues to rage over the open Atlantic waters as a major hurricane, with the Canadian Hurricane Centre now keeping a close eye on its track and potential impacts on the East Coast over the next week.

As of the Monday morning update, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said the hurricane was about 1,290 km east-southeast of the northern Leeward Islands and moving toward the northwest near 13 km/h.

"This general motion is expected to continue for the next several days, with an increase in forward speed beginning on Thursday," the NHC says.

On Saturday, Sam became a major hurricane when it crossed the Category 3 threshold, then reached Category 4 later that day. Sam remains a Category 4 hurricane with maximum sustained winds near 215 km/h and even higher gusts. Little change in strength is expected during the next day or so and Sam is expected to remain as a major hurricane for several days.

At this point, it looks like Bermuda will be spared from hurricane conditions as Sam is expected to track well to the east of the island. However, heavy rain and tropical storm force winds are still expected across Bermuda on Friday night and into Saturday

Forecasters are also keeping a close eye on Sam for potential Canadian impacts, though it is much too early to know whether Atlantic Canada will be threatened by the hurricane. Still, with the damage recently caused by Hurricane Larry, the region remains on edge to possibly be in line for more tropical trouble.

"The most likely scenario is that Sam will recurve and stay out to sea and not be a major threat to Atlantic Canada. However, this is still nearly a week away and it is possible that Sam will track further to the north and west and have a significant impact on southern and eastern parts of the region, with the highest risk being southeastern Newfoundland Sunday or Monday of next week," says Dr. Doug Gillham, a meteorologist at The Weather Network.

In addition to Sam, forecasters are closely watching two more systems – one in the east central Atlantic and another that is just coming off the coast of Africa as well. Both systems are expected to become tropical storms later this week and would be named Victor and Wanda.

"These storms will take a more southerly track across the Atlantic and will have to be closely watched over the next 10-14 days," Gillham adds.

Sam is the seventh hurricane of the 2021 Atlantic season. Hurricane season traditionally runs from June 1st to Nov. 30, with substantial flexibility on either side of that range.

Be sure to check back for the latest updates on the Atlantic hurricane season.

COVID-19 vaccine exemptions: Where do different religions stand on vaccinations?

September 27, 2021
By Rajesh Khanna


(NEXSTAR/WSYR) – As significant numbers of Americans seek religious exemptions from COVID-19 vaccine mandates, many faith leaders are saying: Not with our endorsement.

Leaders of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America said last week that while some people may have medical reasons for not receiving the vaccine, “there is no exemption in the Orthodox Church for Her faithful from any vaccination for religious reasons.”

What are other religious leaders saying about the COVID-19 vaccines?

Catholicism

The head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Francis, has urged people to get the COVID-19 vaccine and said that getting the shot is an “act of love”.

“Thanks to God’s grace and to the work of many, we now have vaccines to protect us from COVID-19,” the pope said in the video below. He continued on to say that vaccines “bring hope to end the pandemic, but only if they are available to all and if we collaborate with one another.”

Pope Francis received his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine back in January, according to The Vatican.

There was some controversy as to whether the vaccines’ development made them morally permissible according to the church. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released a statement clearing up the confusion:

Neither the Pfizer nor the Moderna vaccine involved the use of cell lines that originated in fetal tissue taken from the body of an aborted baby at any level of design, development, or production. They are not completely free from any connection to abortion, however, as both Pfizer and Moderna made use of a tainted cell line for one of the confirmatory lab tests of their products. There is thus a connection, but it is relatively remote.

Some are asserting that if a vaccine is connected in any way with tainted cell lines then it is immoral to be vaccinated with them. This is an inaccurate portrayal of Catholic moral teaching.

In March of 2021, the organization questioned the moral permissibility of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine, however, was developed, tested and is produced with abortion-derived cell lines raising additional moral concerns. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has judged that ‘when ethically irreproachable Covid-19 vaccines are not available … it is morally acceptable to receive Covid-19 vaccines that have used cell lines from aborted fetuses in their research and production process.’[1] However, if one can choose among equally safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines, the vaccine with the least connection to abortion-derived cell lines should be chosen. Therefore, if one has the ability to choose a vaccine, Pfizer or Moderna’s vaccines should be chosen over Johnson & Johnson’s.

Judaism

Mitzvah is one of the Torah’s 613 Divine commandments; a good deed or religious precept, according to Rabbi Yehuda Shurpin. Rabbi Shurpin writes “guarding your own health doesn’t only make sense, it’s actually a mitzvah. That means that even if you don’t want to do it, for whatever reason, you are still obligated to do so.”

The three major branches of modern Judaism include Reform, Orthodox, and Conservative. Organizations and leaders across the three branches have released statements in support of vaccinations.

The Union for Reform Judaism adopted the Resolution on Mandatory Immunization laws in 2015. The resolution supports mandatory immunization laws and urges congregations to educate members on the “scientific evidence and Jewish values in support of mandatory vaccinations.”

The Orthodox Union also released a statement in support of COVID-19 vaccinations:
Tempted to take expired medicines? Here’s what you need to know

Islam

The Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America said in a statement that there is no way to stop the pandemic besides reaching herd immunity. Herd immunity requires a certain percentage of a population have immunity to a virus. The AMJA says this can happen one of two ways:
Allowing the infection to spread among the people without curtailing it
Vaccinating people against the virus

The first way does not conform with the Sharia, because it risks the lives of people, particularly the weak, which is in direct conflict with the intent of the legislator with regard to preserving all human lives. …

The second way is through vaccination, which is congruent with the Sharia and reason.

Many Muslims who practice Islam avoid pork. The National Muslim COVID-19 Task Force shared in December 2020 that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines “contain fat, salts/buffer agents, and sugar (sucrose). The fat is not made from pork products.”

Buddhism

Buddhism has no central authority that determines doctrine, but the Dalai Lama received his COVID-19 vaccine in India in March.

After receiving his shot, the Dalai Lama said, “Those other patients also should take this injection for greater benefit,” calling the shot “very, very helpful”.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

The First Presidency, the governing body of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, urged Latter-day Saints to get vaccinated against COVID-19 in August, saying, “To provide personal protection from such severe infections, we urge individuals to be vaccinated. Available vaccines have proven to be both safe and effective.”

Christian Science

A small branch of Christianity, Christian Science released a statement on vaccinations and public health.

According to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, “One of the basic teachings of this denomination is that disease can be cured or prevented by focused prayer and members will often request exemptions when available. However, there are no strict rules against vaccination and members can receive required vaccinations.”

For more than a century, our denomination has counseled respect for public health authorities and conscientious obedience to the laws of the land, including those requiring vaccination. Christian Scientists report suspected communicable disease, obey quarantines, and strive to cooperate with measures considered necessary by public health officials. We see this as a matter of basic Golden Rule ethics and New Testament love. …

Most of our church members normally rely on prayer for healing. It’s a deeply considered spiritual practice and way of life that has meant a lot to us over the years. So we’ve appreciated vaccination exemptions and sought to use them conscientiously and responsibly, when they have been granted.

On the other hand, our practice isn’t a dogmatic thing. Church members are free to make their own choices on all life-decisions, in obedience to the law, including whether or not to vaccinate. These aren’t decisions imposed by their church.

A CHRISTIAN SCIENCE PERSPECTIVE ON VACCINATION AND PUBLIC HEALTH

Christianity

As there are many Christian denominations, not all were broken down in this article. According to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the following Christian denominations have no theological objection to vaccination:
Roman Catholicism
Eastern Orthodox
Oriental Orthodox
Amish
Anglican
Baptist
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints​ (Mormon)
Congregational
Episcopalian
Jehovah’s Witness (Note: This denomination originally denounced vaccination, but revised this doctrine in 1952. An article in a recent issue of the church’s newsletter promotes vaccination to avoid infectious diseases.)
Lutheran
Mennonite
Methodist (including African Methodist Episcopal)
Quaker
Pentecostal
Presbyterian
Seventh-Day Adventist
Unitarian-Universalist

Vanderbilt University Medical Center says the following denominations do have a theological objection to vaccination:

Dutch Reformed Congregations – This denomination has a tradition of declining immunizations. Some members decline vaccination on the basis that it interferes with divine providence. However, others within the faith accept immunization as a gift from God to be used with gratitude.
Faith healing denominations including:
Faith Tabernacle
Church of the First Born
Faith Assembly
End Time Ministrie
Church of Christ, Scientist

Race to the bottom: the disastrous blindfolded rush to mine the deep sea

One of the largest mining operations ever seen on Earth aims to despoil an ocean we are only barely beginning to understand

“We have never entered a frontier and not fucked it up more.”

Cutting machines developed for deep-sea mining. Mining today is often from mega-pits so big they can be seen from space, but they are governed by laws drawn up 150 years ago in the era of picks and shovels. Photograph: Nautilus Minerals

LONG READ

by Jonathan Watts, global environment editor
Seascape: the state of our oceans is supported by

Mon 27 Sep 2021 



Ashort bureaucratic note from a brutally degraded microstate in the South Pacific to a little-known institution in the Caribbean is about to change the world. Few people are aware of its potential consequences, but the impacts are certain to be far-reaching. The only question is whether that change will be to the detriment of the global environment or the benefit of international governance.

In late June, the island republic of Nauru informed the International Seabed Authority (ISA) based in Kingston, Jamaica of its intention to start mining the seabed in two years’ time via a subsidiary of a Canadian firm, The Metals Company (TMC, until recently known as DeepGreen). Innocuous as it sounds, this note was a starting gun for a resource race on the planet’s last vast frontier: the abyssal plains that stretch between continental shelves deep below the oceans.

In the three months since it was fired, the sound of that shot has reverberated through government offices, conservation movements and scientific academies, and is now starting to reach a wider public, who are asking how the fate of the greatest of global commons can be decided by a sponsorship deal between a tiny island and a multinational mining corporation.

The risks are enormous. Oversight is almost impossible. Regulators admit humanity knows more about deep space than the deep ocean. The technology is unproven. Scientists are not even sure what lives in those profound ecosystems. State governments have yet to agree on a rulebook on how deep oceans can be exploited. No national ballot has ever included a vote on excavating the seabed. Conservationists, including David Attenborough and Chris Packham, argue it is reckless to go ahead with so much uncertainty and such potential devastation ahead.

Louisa Casson, an oceans campaigner at Greenpeace International, says the two-year deadline is “really dangerous”. Given the potential risks of fisheries disturbance, water contamination, sound pollution and habitat destruction for dumbo octopuses, sea pangolins and other species, she says no new licences should be approved. “This is now a test of governments who claim to want to protect the oceans,” she said. “They simply cannot allow these reckless companies to rush headlong into a race to the bottom, where little-known ecosystems will be ploughed up for profit, and the risks and liabilities will be pushed on to small island nations. We need an urgent deep-sea mining moratorium to protect the oceans.”

Mining companies also insist on urgency – to start exploration. They say the minerals – copper, cobalt, nickel and magnesium – are essential for a green transition. If the world wants to decarbonise and reach net-zero emissions by 2050, they say we must start extracting the resources for car batteries and wind turbines soon. They already have exploration permits for an expanse of international seabed as large as France and Germany combined, an area that is likely to expand rapidly. All they need now is a set of internationally agreed operating rules. The rulebook is being drawn up by the ISA, set up in 1994 by the United Nations to oversee sustainable seabed exploration for the benefit of all humanity. But progress is slower than mining companies and their investors would like.

That is why Nauru’s action is pivotal. By triggering the “two-year rule”, the island nation has in effect given regulators 24 months to finish the rulebook. At that point, it says TMC’s subsidiary Nauru Ocean Resources Inc (NORI), intends to apply for approval to begin mining in the Clarion-Clipperton zone, an expanse of the North Pacific between Hawaii and Mexico.

The deep ocean is the least known environment on Earth, a realm that still inspires awe and wonder. By one estimate, 90% of the species that researchers collect are new to science, including the pale “ghost” octopus that lays its eggs on sponge stalks anchored to manganese nodules or the single-celled, tennis-ball sized Xenophyophores. In the midnight, hadal and abyssal zones, fish and other creatures must make their own light. Biolumescent loosejaw and humpback blackdevils, a type of anglerfish, have evolved with in-built lanterns to seek out and draw in their prey. First-time human visitors often go expecting darkness and return filled with wonder at the undersea displays of living fireworks. Marine biologists believe there may be more bioluminescent creatures in the deep sea than there are species on land.

A dumbo octopus, just one of millions of barely understood deep-sea species

 at risk from mining. 

Photograph: NOAA

There is also thought to be a greater wealth of minerals such as copper, nickel, cobalt and rare earth elements such as yttrium, as well as substantial veins of gold, silver and platinum. Most are found near hydrothermal vents or in rock concretions known as polymetallic nodules that can be as big as a fist or as small as a fleck of skin. The challenge is gouging them out and lifting them up to the surface. When the first attempts were made to harvest nodules in the mid-1970s, the chief executive in charge of the operation exasperatedly described the task as like “standing on the top of the Empire State Building, trying to pick up small stones on the sidewalk using a long straw, at night”. Today’s technology has moved on, but scientists and conservationists doubt that it is ready and the environmental risks are fully understood. They would like more time. Nauru and TMC have given them less. The countdown clock now has 21 months left, and counting.

History does not offer much encouragement to the denizens of the deep that the issue will be resolved in their favour. Mining has provided the building blocks of civilisation. Without ore, humankind could not have had the iron age, the bronze age and certainly not the great cultures of ancient China, Nubia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, the Aztecs or Mayans. In modern times, particularly the great post-second world war acceleration of the past 70 years, more has probably been gouged from the Earth than in all of previous human history combined.

The materials for a built and manufactured environment are extracted at the expense of natural beauty, resilience and stability. For most of human history, this was considered a fair trade-off. The costs – cleared forests, scarred landscapes, polluted water, air filled with dust, carcinogens and greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere – were either unknown or deemed small compared with the gains. They rarely appeared on corporate or national balance sheets. Miners extracted oil, gas, coal, iron, gold, copper, lithium and other minerals, while leaving other species, remote communities and future generations to pay the price.

‘Any claim of not being environmentally damaging is meaningless, as we have no idea now what that environment is’ ... a grabber breaks off a section of hydrothermal vent. Photograph: Nautilus minerals

‘A throwback to the robber baron era’

Mining has often proved a trade based on imported resources and exported risk. In recent decades, this trade-off has come into question as scientific knowledge of the consequences has advanced. Environmental concerns have prompted calls for stricter regulation. But, oversight, if it exists at all, is often shaped by those who stand to benefit in the short term rather than those left to clean up the mess. And mines are moving further from power centres, which means less likelihood of Nimby protests, media coverage, challenges by conservationists or legal redress. Most of today’s mega-mines are in remote regions: the Carajás iron-ore complex and the Paragominas bauxite mine in the state of Pará, northern Brazil; the Oyu Tolgoi copper mine in Mongolia’s Gobi desert; Bingham Canyon copper mine in Utah’s Oquirrh Mountains; Chuquicamata copper mine in Chile’s Atacama desert; Mirny mine in Siberian Russia; or the many offshore oil and gas wells in the Gulf of Mexico, the North Sea, the Caribbean and elsewhere.


David Attenborough calls for ban on 'devastating' deep sea mining


If mining in the deep ocean is technologically challenging and expensive, then independent oversight is even tougher: beyond all national jurisdictions, too expensive for environmental organisations to reach, too inaccessible for all but invited journalists to visit, and totally free of people so no chance of hold-ups by protesters. Fish, crustaceans and microbes might suffer, but they cannot complain.

Just like almost every other mining project in history, TMC and other mining companies promise to maintain the highest environmental standards, and to operate within guidelines laid out by regulatory bodies. And just like almost every other mining project in history, it is in their interest to exert pressure on those same regulatory bodies to ensure projects go ahead quickly with environmental standards that do not sink their bottom line.

Payal Sampat, mining programme director at the Earthworks environmental charity, said the rushed approach to deep-sea mining was reminiscent of the wild-west prospectors of the 19th century. “This really is a throwback to the early robber baron era. Our global heritage is being decided in small backroom discussions. Most people are completely unaware that this enormous planet-changing decision is being made. It is very non-transparent.” She said the mining industry had never been properly regulated. Today’s mega-pits are so big they can be seen from space, but they are governed by laws drawn up 150 years ago in the era of picks and shovels. “Deep-sea mining really represents a continuation of that destructive extractivist mindset. It is all about looking at the next frontier rather than using the resources we already have much better.”

‘Nauru was once a tropical paradise. Now, thanks to human avarice and short-sightedness, our island is mostly a wasteland’ ... former minister of Nauru, which was scarred by phosphate mining. 

Photograph: Reuters

The wasteland

Nauru ought to provide a salutary reminder of the destructive spiral that follows when an ecosystem is sucked dry. Once described as a Pacific idyll, the island’s topsoil was stripped of phosphate first by the British, then the Germans, then New Zealanders and Australians. They wanted the deposits to fertilise gardens and farmland in their own countries, and promised to restore the landscape and fully compensate those affected by environmental damage. By the time of independence in 1968, enough phosphate was left to briefly make the country’s 12,000 inhabitants the second-richest people on Earth. As phosphate prices rose from $10 a ton to more than $65 in the 1970s, gross domestic product per capita topped $50,000, second only to Saudi Arabia.

But within two decades, the resource was virtually exhausted, leaving an inland moonscape of gnarled, spiky rock and an economy in tatters. Restitution funds were supposed to rehabilitate 400 hectares (1,000 acres), but they have been frittered away in the past 25 years with barely six hectares recovered.

The gutting of the topsoil has caused unforeseen problems to the local climate, vegetation and society. Loss of vegetation has prevented rain clouds from forming over the island and led to more droughts. Several endemic plant species are now endangered and food production has been affected. Locals have turned from healthy local produce, such as coconuts, to fatty and salty tinned goods, resulting in one of the highest levels of obesity, heart disease and diabetes in the world. As one former finance minister put it: “Nauru was once a tropical paradise, a rainforest hung with fruits and flowers, vines and orchids. Now, thanks to human avarice … and short-sightedness, our island is mostly a wasteland.”

The 12,000 inhabitants have resisted repeated attempts to relocate them to an island off Queensland and looked for new ways to make a living. After the economy collapsed, the desperate government turned to offshore banking. But with customers that included the Russian mafia and al-Qaida, the US Treasury blacklisted the island as a centre of money laundering and corruption. After that failure, the microstate rented itself out to Australia as a detention centre for asylum seekers, a business that now provides more than half of the state revenue. When that declined, Nauru began to eye up the surrounding seabed by teaming up with TMC, which is paying tens of millions of dollars a year in royalties for its fully owned NORI subsidiary.

At the ISA, Nauru is supposed to be a sponsor nation for TMC. In reality, the island acts more like a client state for the corporation, and a company executive can behave as its spokesperson. In 2019, as chairman of DeepGreen Metals, Gerard Barron, was listed as a member of the Nauru delegation and spoke from the island’s seat in the plenary meeting.

Gerard Barron says The Metals Company would halt production after the world has enough minerals for 2bn batteries, though critics are sceptical about this promise. Photograph: Carolyn Cole/Los Angeles Times/Shutterstock

Little wonder then that eyebrows were raised when this tiny nation, which constitutes just 0.00016% of the world’s population, took the initiative to open up the seabed. Few observers doubt that this was done at the behest of TMC.

Matthew Gianni, co-founder of the Deep Sea Conservation Coalition, said: “This is all about money – money for DeepGreen [TMC] and its shareholders and money for Nauru – and the fear that if DeepGreen doesn’t get a licence soon, investors will walk away from the company and both DeepGreen and Nauru will lose out on any revenue.” He said the case showed the need to shake up international governance. “The ISA’s decision-making process is seriously flawed and needs to be fixed.”

In lieu of comment, The Metals Company referred questions to three external experts that it said specialised in deep-sea ecosystems and plume dynamics.

TMC is among a cluster of mining companies that argue seabed minerals are essential if the world is to make the transition from fossil fuels to renewables. Barron, its chief executive and chairman, is fond of stating that a single 75kW electric vehicle battery requires 56kg of nickel and 7kg each of manganese and cobalt, plus 85kg of copper for the vehicle’s wiring. To convert the world’s 1bn-plus combustion-engine cars to electric would require far more metal than is currently produced on land. Barron says tapping seabed resources would still not close the supply gap, but that it could accelerate the transition, reduce mining emissions and provide revenue for poorer countries. As a sign of TMC’s commitment to the environment, he says the company would halt production after the world has enough minerals for 2bn batteries, because that would be enough to allow full recycling.
Once you start, it'll be hard to stop. Mining needs 30 years to recoup investment. It’s not something you put back in the boxLisa Levin, Scripps Institution of Oceanography

But many battery-makers and industrial users are lining up with the conservationists rather than the miners. In April, BMW, Volvo, Google and Samsung joined a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) call for a moratorium on seabed mining. Scientists and campaigners say TMC is creating a false sense of urgency about the need for deep-sea minerals. They say existing mineral supplies are sufficient for the coming 10 years and after that much of the demand could be met by fast-improving recycling technology. Others are sceptical about the promise of a 2bn battery cap. Lisa Levin, a professor of biological oceanography at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, said: “Once you start up a new industry it won’t just be DeepGreen [TMC], it will be multiple countries. It will be very hard to stop. Mining needs to continue for 20 or 30 years to recoup investment. It’s not something you put back in the box.”

A 2015 meeting of the International Seabed Authority (ISA) in Kingston, Jamaica. Photograph: David McFadden/AP

Who are the ISA?

Many observers accept that deep-sea mining will go ahead at some point. But it needs to be done carefully, after the risks are fully assessed, the technology is perfected and oversight systems are made as robust as possible to ensure minimal impact on ocean ecosystems. The world might have more confidence that this was the case if the regulatory body was more open, more democratic, less focused on commercial gain and more attuned to environmental loss. As it is, however, the ISA is geared towards ploughing ahead.

It held its first meeting in Kingston, Jamaica, on 16-18 November 1994. The venue for this and subsequent gatherings was the Jamaica Conference Centre, which boasts of being “the Caribbean’s most sophisticated meeting place”. In the heat outside, angular concrete lines stand out between palm trees and fountains. Inside, the air-conditioned conference centre is decorated with bright hand-woven panels. This is a multinational world where you pay in dollars. ISA delegates roll up in diplomatic limousines, some with little flags on the bonnet, and congregate between meeting rooms, the marble lobby, and over cocktails in bars looking out across the Caribbean. In the evenings, delegates and contractors are invited to soirees hosted by the Jamaican government or dinner at the mansion of the ISA secretary general, Michael Lodge, high on the hill overlooking the harbour.

Lodge, a British lawyer, wants member states to agree on a rulebook that will set standards for mining practices and allow commercial operations to begin. Discussions on this topic have been under way since 2017, but have been snarled up over how to share future mining proceeds among nations. The ISA prefers to treat this as a technocratic problem. But, as the intervention of Nauru has shown, this is about much more fundamental issues of global governance and politics. Does the world want to be pushed into the final frontier of the global commons by a desperate microstate and a multinational mining company? Is it willing to take the risk that the ocean floor will end up like Nauru, a victim of over-exploitation and false promises of restoration?

Archive documents show corporations have tried to influence the ISA since its inception. In the 1980s, multinational corporations, such as Lockheed Martin and Sumitomo, were lobbying governments to ensure the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea “should contain a bias in favour of mining production”.

The UN general assembly subsequently approved the funding of the ISA in 1994, noting that the ocean floor and subsoil, beyond the limits of national jurisdiction, were the common heritage of humanity and should be dealt with in line with “the growing reliance on market principles”. Other species and ecosystems were an afterthought. To circumvent regulatory hold-ups, wealthy nations also pushed for a “two-year rule” that could be initiated by any country. Once that process begins, the onus shifts to the regulators to adopt exploitation regulations within 24 months.

In theory, every country in the world is involved in the ISA’s decision-making. In practice, power lies with a small group of experts that is weighted in favour of mining. There is no specialist environmental or science assessment group to vet applications for new contracts. Instead, new contracts are initially made by the ISA’s Legal and Technical Commission (LTC), which comprises just 30 members. Their decisions can only be overturned by a super-majority of two thirds of the full council, which comprises 36 states.

The commission has a 100% record of approving exploration applications, for which ISA charges a $500,000 (£365,000) processing fee. Membership of the LTC is skewed towards extraction rather than environmental oversight – a fifth of the members work directly for contractors with deep-sea mining projects. They include Nobuyuki Okamoto, who established Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation, which has started its own seafloor exploration, and Carsten Rühlemann, who works for Germany’s Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources, which holds exploration contracts in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Many others have a background in mining or oil and gas exploration. Among them are the chair of the commission, Harald Brekke, who is a senior geologist at the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate; Pakistan’s representative, Khalid Mehmood Awan, who has worked for offshore oil and gas companies; and an Australian geologist, Mark Alcock, who is listed as working previously in surveying for petroleum and minerals exploration. By comparison, only three members are obviously focused on marine ecosystems, such as Gordon Lindsay Paterson, a zoologist at the Natural History Museum in London.

A spokesperson for the ISA said: “Members of the LTC are elected by the council from among the candidates nominated by states parties to UNCLOS [United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea]. States parties shall nominate candidates of the highest standards of competence and integrity with qualifications in relevant fields. The council shall endeavour to ensure that the membership of the LTC reflects all appropriate qualifications. In the election of members of the LTC, due account shall be taken of the need for equitable geographical distribution and the representation of special interests.”

It added that 31 contracts for exploration had been granted so far and the “evaluation by the LTC of an application for a plan of work for exploration is a rigorous process”.

Deep-sea mining off the Papua New Guinea coast. 

Photograph: Nautilus Minerals

Some members of the LTC privately recognise the need for change, so the risks to this vast new area of exploration can be properly evaluated. “We probably know more about outer space than we do about this [deep-sea] frontier,” said a delegate who asked to remain anonymous. “I have heard suggestions for more environmental oversight, and I cannot say I have a contrary view.”

It is not just small island states that are complicit. Seabed resources are supposed to benefit all of humanity and promote sustainable development, but just three companies from wealthy nations have a hand in eight of the 10 contracts to explore for minerals in the Pacific’s Clarion-Clipperton zone that have been awarded since 2010: the Canadian-registered TMC (formerly DeepGreen), the Belgian corporation Dredging Environmental and Marine Engineering (DEME), and UK Seabed Resources, a subsidiary of the US arms manufacturer Lockheed Martin.

The role of these companies is opaque. None of the parent companies are included by the ISA in its list of contractors. A common practice is to operate through subsidiaries or by taking shares in partners in small island states, often in conjunction with national governments. This leads to concerns about accountability in the event of an accident: the subsidiaries are often small, which could leave poor nations with huge liabilities.

The British government has fudged its response to Nauru pulling the two-year trigger. This seems appropriate for a former colonial power that is still struggling to match its claims for environmental leadership with actions that run against its continued dependence on exploiting overseas resources. In 2019, the House of Commons environmental audit committee, including the Tory MP Zac Goldsmith, now Lord Goldsmith and minister for Pacific and the environment, concluded that deep-sea mining would have “catastrophic impacts on the seafloor”; that the ISA benefiting from revenues from issuing mining licenses was “a clear conflict of interest” and that the case for deep-sea mining had not yet been made.

Any claim of not being environmentally damaging is meaningless, as we have no idea now what that environment is 

Will McCallum, Greenpeace

However, ties between the UK government and the deep-sea mining industry have been unhealthily cosy. A Cabinet Office official has moved to Lockheed Martin, which owns UK Seabed Resources, to head their government affairs department. The former prime minister David Cameron used Lockheed Martin’s estimates of the potential value of the deep-sea mining industry, rather than independent analysis. When Greenpeace was finally granted a freedom of information request for the deep-sea mining licences between the British government and UK Seabed Resources, it found it was “riddled with errors and inaccuracies”, that it was based on outdated legislation and that it extended for a duration beyond the limits permitted by UK law.

When asked a parliamentary question about Nauru and the two-year trigger, the then business minister Nadhim Zahawi refused to support a moratorium and said the UK’s position was to wait for sufficient scientific evidence and strong environmental regulations. Zahawi has a deeper background in mineral exploration than any other MP. Before he joined the government, he received more than £1m in salary and bonuses from Gulf Keystone Petroleum, worked as a consultant for the Canadian oil firm Talisman and declared shares in the oil firm Genel Energy and Gulf Keystone. There is no suggestion of wrongdoing but – like many members of the LTC – he may be predisposed towards the extractive industries, having made a living from them for so many years.

Activists say it is not too late to stop the clock; opposition is gaining momentum. The world congress of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature earlier this month voted overwhelmingly to ban deep-sea mining. Support for the motion came from government delegates as well as civil society. Although the vote is non-binding, it highlights the broad unease at the shotgun tactics of Nauru and TMC. There are also plans for an appeal to another UN body, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, against allowing deep-sea mining.

Hydrothermal vents in the Lau Basin, near Fiji. 

Photograph: Charles Fisher/Pennsylvania State University/

Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute

Our common heritage

Few countries are outright opposed to the mining, but many would prefer to wait. Their motives differ widely. On one side are nations such as Costa Rica, Fiji and Germany that are wary about the environmental implications. On the other are nations such as Chile and many African countries, with strong terrestrial mining interests, that do not want to see more competition that could drive down prices for their minerals. The African Group of nations has come out strongly against Nauru’s move, saying it is “likely to weaken rather than facilitate the development of an effective regime fully embodying the common heritage of mankind principle”.

Academics and civil society groups believe TMC has overplayed its hand. They hope its premature move to set a deadline will spur reforms of the ISA. Pradeep Singh, an ISA observer and ocean expert at the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies in Potsdam, Germany, said: “It does not say too much about the ISA decision-making process, to be honest, except that it is regrettable that the provision has been invoked. Perhaps the timing of the move to invoke the provision is less related to actually getting the process moving at the ISA but more related to increasing market confidence or value, and attracting investors to invest in the contractor.”


Beneath the blue: dive into a dazzling ocean under threat – interactive

The case raises still deeper questions about humanity’s treatment of the Earth, particularly the dangerous gap between caring for our immediate local environment while turning a blind eye to what happens in the planet’s more remote corners. The French philosopher Bruno Latour traces this back to colonial thinking, which continues in present-day neoliberal capitalism. “Every state delineated by its borders is obliged, by definition, to lie about what allows it to exist since, if it is wealthy and developed, it has to expand over other territories on the quiet, though without seeing itself as being responsible for those territories in any way,” he writes in his new book After Lockdown: A Metamorphosis. “That’s a basic hypocrisy that creates a disconnect between, on the one hand, the world I live in as a citizen of a developed country, and, on the other, the world I live off, as a consumer of the same country. As if every state was coupled with a shadow state that never stopped haunting it, a doppelganger that provides for it on the one hand and is devoured by it, on the other.”

A pithier argument is made by Will McCallum, head of oceans at Greenpeace UK, who fears the deep sea will suffer like all other newly opened territories. “Any claim of not being environmentally damaging is meaningless, as we have no idea now what that environment is,” he said.

“We have never entered a frontier and not fucked it up more.”